So back in March of 2018 I placed an order for what at the time was known as the Gen.3 version of the “Tacoma World Group-Buy RTT”. In the time since it has been branded, and an actual company has been formed to sell these at the rate the growing demand requires. I’m proud to announce that I’m the first non-Toyota owner to run the Waypoint RTT by COE Vehicle Solutions. After a 3-month wait from order placement (this is getting faster, don’t worry) I met the organizer, Chandler Coe, as he hand-delivered the tent in his brand new Dodge 3500 diesel, lifted and running 37s, towing a 30’ car hauler full of tents. We talked for a few minutes, then he vanished into the night to finish his week-long haul of tents around the country.

Moving it into the garage, it then came time to see what was inside. The box opening was labor intensive, but this thing was packaged well. I removed a bunch of plastic wrap, and excitedly opened it up for the first time as Dani looked on. The initial smell was a punch to the senses, so we let it air out in the garage for the better part of a week before moving on with installation. The tent itself is 85” long, and due to the roof crossbar spacing on the WK2, this left the front two+ feet of the tent cantilevered. To combat this design and support the front, I pieced together a Thule clamp-on crossbar kit from eBay and added what is essentially a third crossbar to hold the front end of the tent down.​

The mounting utilizes 8 bolts that fit into brackets that are to be positioned inside the recessed mounting track in the bottom of the tent. Slid into place at the 1st and 3rd crossbars, I tightened the bolts down with the supplied tools (ratcheting box wrench included!) and hardware. The compressed latter opened up easily, and we climbed up to see how comfy our new home-on-wheels was.

There’s a 2.5” foam pad inside, and the entire interior is covered in a stitched fabric. The 4 gas struts to raise the roof are covered in padding, there are two hanging pockets for miscellaneous gear, shoes, etc, two overhead hooks for other stuff, and a netting suspended overhead for whatever you haven’t already found a place for. It’s incredibly spacious inside, and our two-person sleeping bag fits perfectly corner to corner. The tent itself has entry options from both sides, including mounts for the ladder to be affixed to. Each doorway (left and right) has a fabric outer door that becomes an awning, a fly made of netting, and another solid interior door for privacy at night or in the cold while retaining the awning. There are large windows at the front and back of the tent, and two 4” square ventilation pockets, one on each side. The tent is able to close with all of our stuff inside, including the sleeping bag, pillows, headlamps, etc. which will make it a dream when we’re on trips.

We’ve spent one night in the tent so far, and loved it. We’ll have to get used to climbing out if we have to pee at night, but the elevated position allows for a great breeze (wonderful on hot nights), keeps us away from little critters, and offers more privacy. While other tents charge a few hundred dollars more for a black shell, a few hundred dollars more for a larger size, and a ton for shipping, COE Vehicle Solutions has this on the market for $1,750 delivered. It was the perfect tent to get us into the RTT market while maintaining the sexy aesthetics of this Jeep build, and allowing for a minimal impact on fuel economy. A recent trip to upstate New York required us bringing the Jeep, and with both the new Falken AT/3W tires and the RTT mounted, we averaged 21.5 MPG round trip over 450 miles… not bad at all given the fact that the Trailhawk was basically expedition-ready the whole time.

Happy to answer any questions, and very excited to use this on upcoming overland expeditions.

After a few months of behind-the-scenes work, I'm excited to announce a new partnership with Falken Tires. The WK2 now has the OEM Goodyear Adventure tires replaced with the new Wildpeak AT3W all-terrain tires. While the Grand Cherokee can actually fit a larger tire than what I went with, I wanted to keep the appearance aggressive but not overdone, so I chose the less-popular 265/65R18 size, equivalent to a 31.6" tire. It's about an inch and a half larger in diameter than the factory tire, and has a great aesthetic and functional improvements for the Jeep.

I brought the Jeep to a local Firestone Tire center and for the whopping cost of $79 had the four main tires swapped, as well as the 5th OEM rim I bought back in April mounted up with the new spare and TPMS sensor. A Jeep friend bought the factory tires from me for his wife's WK2, so they're off to a new home!

Initial impressions with the AT3W are stellar... After taking the Jeep up to New Hampshire for some wheeling in the woods the weekend we had them installed, I got 24-25 MPG during the two hour ride up, and I know without a doubt that the Wildpeaks gave us better traction than the Goodyears ever could have on more difficult terrain than I've ever taken the Trailhawk on.

​I'll give a long-term review as the time comes, but for now here are some photos of the install...

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WK2 Ride Height Settings: 265/65 R18Click images to enlarge.

As discussed previously on a few web forums, I’ve wanted to move the WK2 to a dual-battery setup for quite a while now. The goal will be to move all the auxiliary electrical units (HAM and CB radios, fridge, lighting, device charging, etc.) to the deep cycle battery – hereinafter referred to as the House battery – and get them off the starting battery. By alleviating their power draw from the starting battery, we’ll be lowering the chances of a dead car in the middle of nowhere.

I knew the spare tire was going to be moved to a swing-out tire carrier, which opened up the possibility of mounting the new House battery underneath the rear deck I built last summer. Once the majority of parts were ordered (every single one of them available on Amazon with 2-day delivery) I got to work laying out how this project would go along. The full parts list will be updated once the project is done, but currently is as follows:​

So the first step here was to remove all my gear from the back of the Jeep. This included my Pelican case of recovery and winter camping gear, kept in there in case of an emergency while New England is getting pummeled with adverse weather. Luckily that time of year is almost over. I then pulled the fridge out and removed the rear deck I had built last year. Next up came removing the OEM included gear, the spare tire, jack, and plastic storage cubbies that fit around the wheel. This left me with the open wheel well, from which I removed the plastic surround trim piece.

I purchased a 4’x4’ piece of 3/4" plywood from Home Depot from this project, and had it set up on two sawhorses in the garage. A quick trace with a Sharpie and I had a template to fit inside the wheel well. The Jigsaw made quick work of this and within a few minutes I had a fitted piece of decking to use as a base for the electronics.

Factory Trunk Design

Spare & Jack Removed

Trunk Trim Removed

Tracing the Trunk Deck

Test Fitting

Once the deck was sanded, Dani asked what color I was going to paint it. While my initial thought was just to do it black, she asked for silver… so it’s metallic silver. This actually will work to my benefit, as it will push me even more to keep the wire routing clean, even though it’ll never really be seen. With paint dry, I moved the deck into the house and turned the living room into my mad science laboratory getting the fun part of the project underway.

I unfortunately spent an hour or so cutting up the existing wiring system in the Jeep, pulling out the control box and re-routing the existing auxiliary lighting and radio harnesses to the rear trunk area for use in a few days time. The relay control box was pretty tired after months of working with it and moving it to a resting spot, so I went ahead and ordered a new ABS project box to be installed in the new spot in the back. I chose one that’s a bit larger to allow for future expansion, after measuring and ensuring that it will fit on the deck.

I played around with the parts on the deck once it was in the living room and figured out a clean layout for the equipment. Battery will be on the passenger side, with the Wirthco Intelligent Isolator mounted on a bracket in front of it. In-line fuses to the side and again in front of the (+) post of the House battery. The Blue Sea Systems fuse panel and relay control box will live on the driver’s side of the compartment, and wiring will be routed between the two without needing much distance at all.

It took a quick trip to Harbor Freight to buy a handheld hydraulic crimper to tackle the 4AWG connections, but it seems like a good tool to have for the future. As of now the basic wiring is set, and I’ve pretty much gotten as far as I can before the last bit of parts arrive and I move this set-up into the back of the Jeep.

Lots of photos, and plenty more to come…​

After getting the system tested with temporary wiring, I went ahead and got to work making the necessary wiring looms to get all of the electrical components (lighting, radio/comms, fridge) bought back to the Blue Sea Systems fuse panel and connected appropriately. This took quite a bit of time, and was sort of a pain in the butt, but I think the cleanliness of the end result was worth it.

In order to get the wiring into the trunk area I was hoping to use some kind of brush-plate from home A/V installs, but in my searching I found a computer-desk type grommet for wiring, which turned out to be perfect for my use. It measures about 2.25" across, and using a hole saw I cut out the appropriate hole in the trunk/tire surround trim to allow wiring to pass through. It's high enough to clear the rise in the floor of the vehicle and allows wiring to fit in the minimal gap between the suspension air tank and the floor. This took some tricky snaking, but the end result was worth it. I used adhesive silicone to seal the grommet to the plastic trim, and though it's not 100% perfectly adhered, it has done a good job making it look clean.

After pulling all the loose ends of the aux. component wiring into the trunk space I then had the fun (read: tedious) task of cutting them all to the appropriate lengths so they fit cleanly and were able to be loomed up together in the trunk. Testing each fixture one at a time, reappropriating the right fuse size to the connection point, and checking the dash panel switches as I went to make sure everything was functioning appropriately from a control standpoint. Once all was great I used some more of the adhesive tie-downs to secure everything in an organized manner, then took some photos and put the storage deck back on top, calling it a day.

For now the system is fully functioning and seems to be doing so flawlessly. In the next few weeks I'm going to install a 12v meter by the fridge so I can monitor the house battery without lifting the storage deck lid, and also a switch to disable the isolator system. Because it's intelligent and not just passive, it draws a tiny amount of power to see if the starting battery is on or not... where I travel a lot and the vehicle sits in the garage, I'll be able to use the switch to disengage the grounding wire of the isolator to shut it off, essentially disabling the charging capabilities of the second battery until I turn it back on. I've got miscellaneous switches in the basement, so when I've got a meter and time I'll add those to make the entire setup even easier to use.

Final Dual-Battery Install Photos:

Many years ago one of my first projects for the Wrangler was a fire extinguisher bracket for under the driver's seat, an easily accessible location in the event that I ever needed it. I recently stood in the Fire Extinguisher section at Home Depot kicking myself at the realization that we did not carry one with us across Canada this past summer despite the fuel canisters in the Jeep and open gas stoves we used every night to cook around dry pine needles and the like.

With that lovely narrative, let's get to work on installing a fire extinguisher in a WK2 without it being aesthetically annoying or too much in the way:

I bought a 3.7lb Kidde B/C (Auto/Marine) fire extinguisher in a snazzy silver color for $17 at Depot. It came with a plastic mount, but I had horrible visions of a high-speed crash where the plastic would break and the extinguisher would become a missile into the back of my skull in the driver's seat. No problem - quick trip to my local Grainger Supply and I was in possession of a $7 Kidde mount, made from metal and with a metal latching strap. I did have to do some modifications to the bracket to widen the space where the neck of the extinguisher goes in order to make it fit. When it came time to touch up the paint, I ended up painting the whole thing black to make it less visible inside.

I knew I wanted the extinguisher in the rear trunk space, as when we cook with the stove it would be the most accessible. Realistically I think the stove catching fire has a higher likelihood than the engine bay (but fingers crossed for neither), so it's located accordingly.

First off, I put some painter's tape down on the window sill space of the rear-most driver's side window. Driver's side because the fridge is on the passenger side and it seemed too crowded in there for easy access. Holding the bracket up in the space, I used a sharpie to mark through the holes I drilled out for this specific purpose. They're on the flat planes of the bracket. Once the marks were made, I drilled them out with a drill bit appropriately sized for my rivets.​

I had to use some dikes/diagonal wire cutters to get the rivets cut flush, and then was able to fit the extinguisher itself. I used the super scientific "wiggle" test, and the whole assembly seemed sufficiently secure. Ideally I'll never need to use this thing, but I'm glad to know it's back there now.

Final photos:​

The shear strength of these rivets is rated around 420lbs in a "perfect" scenario... where I'm into plastic, the plastic obviously becomes my weakest point. In reviewing it with an engineer friend Rob, he suggested a third rivet to form a triangular fastening situation, which I'll do when I get home. In a usual crash scenario, to its benefit, there's not really a clear path for it to go forward, as it would come into direct contact with the C pillar before moving too far forward. There's only about 6" of space in there after the nozzle of the extinguisher.

It's right to think there's concern with the extinguisher becoming dangerous in a crash because of its mounting, which I believe I put a bit of thought into, but I may re-evaluate beyond a triangulated rivet if I see an issue. I'll keep this updated if any further changes happen.

Diamond 1/4 Wave Antenna Installation:

This is the Kenwood D-710G dual-bander with GPS/APRS and a lot of other features. I chose the Diamond NR72B antenna for aesthetics and function, it's 14" tall and 1/4 wave. This is my first installed mobile rig so it may not be the world's best gear matching (mainly talking about the antenna) but the height was appealing and the range should still be suitable. Diamond shows 2.15dB gain on both 2m and 70cm. The mount is the ever-popular Diamond K400NMO with multi-axis tilting, and this will get mounted on the hood as there aren't many other places on the WK2 where there's enough folded metal to allow for a mount. ​

I finally got a break from Boston's single digit/sub-zero temps and began the installation of my Diamond K400 mount and NR72B antenna in the WK2. Full disclosure, the photos were taken on two different days: first when the Jeep was a mess from the blizzard that had just passed, and the other after a few hours of interior and exterior detailing. Please forgive the dirty ones.

I chose the K400 mount for a hood installation as I'm not quite ready to drill into the roof, and I'm also hoping to get a RTT up there for this year, which would probably negate the ability to have a roof mounted antenna anyway. The hood may not be the single most optimal position for the antenna as far as gain and interference go, but it's clean and will be functional nonetheless. The K400 mount was recommended by a friend and allows for an unobtrusive installation wherever there's a crease in the body panels of a vehicle. It has two adjustable axis which allow to get the antenna vertical regardless of the mounting plane you put it on.

The mount comes with the necessary tools for installation, and is padded on the bottom to protect your vehicle's paint. With four simple allen key'd set-screws underneath that press a stainless steel metal bar against the underside of the mounting location, the bracket becomes secured in place. It took me a few test fittings to get the antenna perfectly vertical from all planes, but once it was aligned correctly I tightened down the adjustable axis allen heads and mounted the Diamond NR72B antenna. Standing only 14" tall, it's sleek on the hood and isn't overly obnoxious for my field of view while driving. This will be perfect for everyday use, and I'll test it on overland trips with the group... It has crossed my mind to maybe get a full 36" antenna as well for long haul trips, much in the same way I have a 3' and 5' CB on my Wrangler for when we're on trips that might separate us more. (There's no mobile dual-band radio in the TJ, just handheld)​

Once the antenna was mounted, I moved on to routing the supplied 13-foot coax line that came with the K400 bracket. Being spoiled by the Warn Zeon Platinum's Wi-Fi remote, I've never actually had to run cable through the firewall of the Trailhawk, so this was going to be a new adventure for me. I did some Google research and read about grommets above the gas and brake pedals, but wasn't able to locate them on this specific model. My hope was for passenger side installation, so I continued digging until I found an article referencing a grommet on the A-Pillar, passenger side of the vehicle. I pulled the necessary internal trim pieces, door sill and the kick plate on the right side of the foot-well, and located the grommet the forum was talking about. I began snaking the tiny coax through the engine bay, down behind the passenger front strut tower, through the wheel well trim, and down into the rocker panel trim piece. I then fed it up a tiny gap in the rocker trim up by the fender flare, and pulled the remaining slack through. This was no easy process, and I was constantly wishing for warmer weather, and to not be lying on the snow covered ground on my back running the cable underneath.

Once the cable was ready, I popped the A-Pillar grommet out of its position and drilled a small hole in it, solely large enough for the cable to get through, which required some good pressure on the tiny SMA adapter at the end to get it through the hole. Once the cable was passed through the grommet I used a coat hanger to puncture a small hole in the vehicle's insulation that was stuffed in the A-Pillar, then taped the SMA adapter to the coat hanger and pulled it back through into the cabin. I ran the coax underneath the door sill trim piece and then under the passenger seat mounting bracket, arriving at the same spot at the CB coax, directly above the battery compartment.​

I put all the trim pieces back together, ensuring the coax was not pinched or stressed as the hood opened and closed, and set to work with moving around the comms system in the cabin. While I don't love the idea of having two transceiver mics in such a small amount of space, I'll be retaining the CB for when we do our local Jeep club runs, and the dual-band for overland trips with my more tight-knit group. I used 3M's "super heavy duty could probably hold up an elephant in an earthquake" double stick tape, and mounted a black plastic mic holder to the dashboard not far from the original mounting position. the Kenwood mic then fit into the original mic mount I made for the CB almost a year ago. It looks okay. It's fine. Dani said there's no loss to the passenger legroom, so we'll run it like this for now until I come up with something better.​

​Kenwood D-710G Installation

When we left off, I had just finished installing the antenna, coax cable, and transceiver mic into the Trailhawk. Next up on the project to-do list was the installation of the Kenwood D-710G transceiver itself, as well as the head unit. After seeing a plethora of installs in WK2 Grand Cherokees with the head unit stored inside the center console cubby (i.e. where the USB charger, 12v plug, and aux input are), I decided I wanted mine to not be as hidden, and also to not be blocking anything useful like the things I listed above.

After some searching on Amazon I discovered the MagicMount universal phone mount. It's small and magnetic, with an exceptionally strong pull for whatever is mounted to it. I decided that I'd figure out a way to mount the 710 remote head to the Magic Mount and place it on the left side of the dashboard by the driver's A-pillar in the cabin. I used the supplied Kenwood remote mount, took my Dremel cut-off wheel to the two mounting/screw tabs, and made it flush across the back for the magnet portion of the mount to adhere to. I re-painted it and attached it to the Kenwood before moving on to installing the MagicMount. Sticking the mount to the dash after cleaning the area with an alcohol, I applied pressure for 60 seconds or so before letting it “cure” overnight. Once that had settled I magnetically attached the D-710G head unit and it's been holding without issue ever since.​

With the remote head in place I then had to connect it to the transceiver with the supplied Ethernet/Cat-6 cable. My initial hope had been to run it under the door sill trim on the driver's side, but the presence of the 6-strand cable for the auxiliary lighting switches made it too difficult to run both wires back under the front seats neatly. Slightly disappointed, I began brainstorming other solutions.

Always hoping for a clean, factory-looking install I removed the A-pillar panel from the dash, the kick trim from the driver's foot-well, and the carpet trim above the brake and gas pedals. I ran the Cat-6 from the top of the A-pillar down to just below the dash trim, then over the foot-well region, following along the tranny tunnel, pushing it ever so slightly up under the trim until I had worked my way back past the driver's seat to the backseat of the Jeep, following along the console in the back and returning it to underneath the passenger seat where the transceiver will live for now. To better illustrate this cable path for anyone interested in following it, I've used a dotted red line on the images below to give you a better idea.​

To facilitate the easy removal of the Kenwood base unit if ever need be, I used industrial strength Velcro (or hook-and-loop depending on where you're from in the world) on the top of the battery compartment tray. The passenger seat has a ton of flexibility with positioning and only comes into contact with the transceiver if it's all the way down in position… luckily my co-pilot isn't the tallest girl around so there shouldn't be any issues squishing it.

The wiring situation isn't immaculate right now so I do not have any images of the battery compartment, but I will be cleaning that up soon and ideally circumventing the potential for even messier wiring by moving to a dual-battery set-up if a few more cards fall into place over the next few months.I used some YouTube videos for help with setting up the basic functions of the radio, and after some trial and error got the APRS set up appropriately. Within an hour I was able to see the GPS location of the Jeep on www.aprs.fi - a great trick that will be very handy in areas with no cell service throughout the continent.

Final install photos of the radio in the main cabin... it's well out of the way of my line of sight while driving, and despite most of the functions being able to be recalled with the mic head, I can easily access the buttons on the head unit if need be.​

Before departing on our month-long Trans-Canada Overland Expedition, one of the most integral additions of gear to the Trailhawk was the Dometic CFX-35 fridge/freezer… I had hesitated at the cost initially but the value this thing brought to our trip as a whole cannot be conveyed. Once I had decided to purchase one (ended up just getting it on Amazon, paid something in the range of $550.00) it became a task of designing a way to have it held down. While I had initially wanted to put it on a slider, spending the extra $200 to buy the kit from Dometic just wasn’t in the budget that close to our departure, so I decided to flat mount it directly to the deck. This is where the need for some kind of secure deck came from.

*please excuse the mess... it's the plastic wrap from the OEM deck that started falling apart

A while back I had seen a thread where a guy used his OEM deck cover and attached mounting hardware to it to tie things down. While the idea was great, I didn’t necessarily want to attach all that weight to the plastic deck that simply “clipped” into place in the back of the Jeep. Measuring the OEM deck to roughly 7/8” tall, I decided that ¾” cabinet plywood would come close enough to be nearly flush. Thinking out the layout I wanted to achieve, I ordered some aircraft L-Track tie-down hardware from US Cargo Control with round tie-down points. These are great because they can slide anywhere on the track and fasten in every 2” as you move down. Total cost from USCargo was $89 delivered.

First up in this process was to remove the OEM deck and trace it against the plywood. Discussing this design with my buddy Shaun who is also a WK2 guy, I offered to make him one as well while we were at it. I used my jigsaw to follow the curvature of the deck, and an orbital sander to clean it up and take down extra material where necessary. It took two or three test fittings before things were great, then we repeated the process on the second deck.​

Shaun’s Dometic was living on the sliding deck, so we built a riser out of 1x3s to get it up enough to clear the rear trunk lip. While he went to work bolting the fridge into the tray - a heck of a process, it seemed - I began laying out my L-tracks. My initial thoughts were to have the fridge be on the 40% fold side of the rear bench, as it’s exactly the same width of the fridge itself. This would obviously allow me to utilize the 60% side if (when) I need to sleep in the back, add some lumber, or store whatever needs to be stored. On the left side of the rear deck I spaced the L-Track far enough apart to fit in stacked Pelican 1610 and 1620 cases that store our camp and cook gear during overland trips. *This may eventually change, as Dani and I have discussed a move towards a drawer system for wherever we go next.

I took some time in the week after to add a bed-liner paint job to the new deck, using a rough, sandpaper like base to it to help things not slide as much. The paint held up pretty well over the course of the summer trip, but wore down a little bit from the Pelicans sliding here and there underneath their ratchet straps.​

I ran power for the fridge through the trunk trim and down to my auxiliary control box under the rear bench, and it functioned absolutely flawlessly during our trip. I had hesitated initially to drop the cash on it, but cannot imagine doing what we did without having the Dometic for fruit, veggies, meats, cheeses, and the occasional cold hard cider. The Pelican cases would move an inch or two over the course of an overlanding day, but the occasional yank on their straps would fix that for a few hours. The fridge never moved an inch, and ran 24/7 from a few days before our departure until I thawed it out upon arriving back in Boston. For the $110 investment into a solid way to secure things down, this plan worked perfectly for both my Trailhawk and Shaun’s Summit.

The final photo below is how the Jeep looked fully loaded, the morning we departed for the QB-5 Overland Adventure in Ontario/Quebec back in July.​

I’ve always liked having an auxiliary set of reverse lights on the Wrangler, and though the factory ones on the WK2 are as impressive as the headlamps, I wanted something I could switch on at any time, and looked sleek. While I wish that I could have used more Black Oak LED products for this, they unfortunately don’t offer a single-row unit for flush mount, instead as of this point only a 2x2 which wouldn’t work for my space. Because of this, I turned to Rigid for their flush-mount version of the SRM reverse light kit that I run on the TJ. Easily purchased on Amazon Prime, they cost about $150 for the kit. Picking a day that my friend Topher from our overland group could help me install them, I drove up to his newly built barn on the North Shore of Mass and we got to work.

First up was to remove the interior trim from the back of the trunk. I started by taking out the rear deck piece, and then removed the spare tire and its accessories. After unbolting the two tie-down mounts (8mm nut) from the rear-most trim piece, I popped that out to gain access to two bolts that hold the spare tire surround to the body of the Jeep. Those are a 10mm nut in the rear, then by folding the middle bench down I removed the snapped-in floor level piece to gain access to two Phillips head screws that hold the front of the tire surround in place. At that point I had free access to fold back the sound-deadening floor mat that lives under the spare tire, and got my first great view of the space I had to work with for wire routing.

I’ll point out the suspension’s air tank up behind the rear bench there… kind of neat to see.

Comparing the trunk space with the vast amount of space underneath the body, I looked at three plugs that were towards the back of the vehicle. Utilizing a step-bit, I drilled the left-most one out to the width to accommodate the 4-wire harness that the reverse lights utilize. Once it was drilled out and cleaned up, I placed a grommet around the immense wire harness (seriously, props to Rigid for including what must have been +20’ of wire loom on this kit for those huge pick-up truck installations) and installed the grommet to the new hole in the Jeep’s floor, leaving enough slack underneath to allow the pre-made harness connections to reach the left and right sides of the rear bumper.

Next up was figuring out where the lights were going to go, though unfortunately with the WK2 there aren’t many options. The steel bumper/crossmember runs almost the entire width of the tailgate, leaving only 6” on either side of it (above the tail pipes) before running into heat shield. That settled that pretty quickly, the lights would live wide on the outside… probably better anyway, and where I had originally intended, but just so any future people know, there isn’t much room for options.

Covering each area with painter’s tape, Topher cut out the stencils and I applied them to the bumper, checking for center and level as I went to try and get it as close to perfect as possible the first time. I used my Dremel cut-off wheel (obviously a favorite tool in this build) to cut out the rough rectangular shape, then a sanding bit to shape it to the light itself. A couple test-fits and some additional sanding allowed the lights to slide in effortlessly and wiggle around a bit, leaving me with the final task of drilling the mounting holes in the lights final position.​

Topher had to meet with the new barn’s General Contractor, so I took some time to clean up my wire looms both inside and out of the vehicle. After finalizing the lengths needed for the water-tight connectors to reach the light fixtures on each side, I used some of the plastic wire-wrap Rigid included to get from the hole in the floor to the rear bumper where I zip-tied it to the existing trailer-wire harness. I cleaned up the runs on both sides to the lights, then worked on the inside of the vehicle to route them.

I followed along the lines of the Black Oak LEDs 30” bar on the roof, using the wire wrap once I was out from underneath the flooring carpet (not wanting it to bulge unnecessarily) then ran the loom to under the rear bench where I could again tie it into the electrical control panel.

At about that point, Topher came back and we were able to, albeit with some frustration, mount the hardware. I wish I’d triple checked my cut region when making the holes, as even a half-inch further outside on both ends would have allowed me to get the hardware in without issue. As it was I had to tape a loc-nut to a stubby wrench to hold the nut in place on each inside fastener. Lesson learned for next time, I guess…. Save yourself the struggle and triple check your measurements even after you’ve double-checked them.

Tightening them down securely, we checked to make sure the included grommet around the light had seated well, which it had. No issues with fitment or flushness with the plastic bumper, and the lights are nicely faced down a bit to illuminate the landscape behind the vehicle. I tied the wire into the control box, and tested the dash-mounted reverse light switch, finding that they worked brilliantly.

Total time on the install, including hanging out with his new puppy for a while and grilling burgers: about 3 hours.​

​They’ll serve well for auxiliary reverse lights and diffused pattern floodlights in working situations or while setting up camp. As an additional feature, I’ve tied them into a solid-state strobe controller that’s also in the fuse panel box. I’ve run strobes on the back of the Wrangler for years and have used them in many, many, many situations, so I figured where this Grand Cherokee will see lots of time out and about across the country and in remote areas, it should have at least some set of strobes in the back.

For those wondering why, it’s situations like flat tires or breakdowns on the side of the highway for my own safety, but I’ve also stopped a dozen or more times over the years in all kinds of New England conditions to bring attention to other broken down motorists until the police arrive… they’re just good to have.The control wiring was done with two independent switches on the dash powering the same lights without having any kind of voltage feedback upstream to the switches. Pretty neat, but a standard use of a diode in a 12v system.

The brightness of these units are fantastic, they draw low power, and they're a clean install with the flush-mount bracket. They've helped us set up countless campsites, helped me as strobes on the road, and have made a lot of things easier at night when we're out with the Trailhawk.

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With the switch panel installed in the dashboard, Rhino roof rack in place, and electrical control box wired and mounted under the back seats, the time finally came to order and install the LED bar that I planned for the roof.

While I’ve always been a Rigid Industries guy (full disclosure, technically this vehicle has one pair of their lights), a friend turned me on to a company called Black Oak LEDs out of Florida while he was working on his Tacoma build. I’d never heard of them before. I saw the quality of the product first, as Rob had 2x 4-LED pods on his front bumper, and learned of the incredible price point second. While the market for LED fixtures has quickly become flooded with cheap knock-offs and poorly assembled units at “affordable” prices on Amazon and other web portals, Black Oak manufacturers one impressively solid and powerful product. I reached out to their products team back in March and began speaking to them about my Trailhawk build, my interest in modifying the WK2 Grand Cherokee line in a way that not many others had done yet, and my intrigue into their larger scale LED product offerings. I was put in touch with a guy named Chris who was equally as interested in getting me on their list of sponsored vehicles, and after a month or so of talking, we got the ball rolling.

Despite quite a bit of research into previous WK2 owner mounts/installations, it didn’t seem that anyone else had ever put a light bar on the roof. Plenty of other owners have done small light bars and pod fog lights in the lower fascia on either side of the ACC camera, though save for one minimally documented roof bracket, it seemed that I was again in uncharted territory for my installation. My plan/hope was to get as wide a light bar as possible, packing in as many lumens as possible, into a very sleek and minimally invasive housing. This without question limited me to a single-row kind of fixture at whatever width the roof rack crossbars would allow. My plan was to tap and drill the cross bar piece to the mounting pattern of the light bar brackets, and cross my fingers it would fit between the cross bar and the glass of the roof. In measuring out the Rhino Rack cross bar to 36” wide after installing it, I then went to work checking out Black Oak’s single-row series of lights, finding their 30” to measure in at 34” with the mounting brackets attached… perfect!

Placed the order on a Tuesday, the light bar shipped on Wednesday and was delivered on Friday with a hand written “Thank you” on the invoice. So far, Black Oak was winning my vote a hundred times over. I eagerly unboxed everything upon returning from a work trip and discovered that despite my attempt to pre-measure everything, there simply wasn’t enough height under the cross bar to allow for the light to fit. Ugh… dead in the water. So after some thought I took it to the local fabrication shop and had them shorten the height of the Black Oak stainless bracket by 3/8”, but that didn’t work either. So I called Black Oak and asked if they could custom make me a bracket, and after speaking with John on the other end he suggested I try their super-short-low-profile-fits-anywhere-awesome-bracket… for an easy to reason $15. It was delivered in 2 days and worked perfectly.

After all these pieces were in order, it took all of 20 minutes to get the cross bar tapped out and finagle my trimmed mounting hardware into the exceptionally narrow tolerance height of the cross bar.

Once the wire was run through the new exit point from the trim piece, I began removing the rear upper trim pieces from the inside of the Grand Cherokee. I have to come to very much dislike removing trim pieces, but it’s the only way to do things cleanly and have myself feel like I’ve done a professional install job, which has become important to me while modifying this vehicle. I toyed with how to get it into the cabin, and ultimately decided to pull out the gasket that houses the controls for the hydraulic tailgate piston. It’s a gigantic gasket, and upon removal I saw that there was plenty of room to sneak the shrink-wrapped Black Oak harness inside of there.

I took the same dremel sanding bit and carefully trimmed back just enough of the gasket’s outer edge (lower edge, ideally to alleviate excess water from getting near it) and fed the wire harness through to the inside of the d-pillar. It’s important to note as you look at the photo below, that I went back later with clear silicone sealant and liberally applied it around the gasket to seal up whatever tiny openings may have arisen from my adjustment to the OEM seal. From there I ran the wire down the d-pillar to the bottom of the tailgate, unscrewing the factor internal cargo hook and running the wiring under the trim pieces and along the length of the spare tire trunk trim piece towards the middle bench.

You can see in the photo below that I highlighted the wiring harnesses external stretch in red, then the pink portion shows where it’s being run inside the vehicle.​

The final bit here was tying the Black Oak harness into the control box I had just built and installed a week or so prior. FYI, for anyone trying this, I ordered one of the Black Oak 8’ extensions for the wiring harness, which I was VERY happy to have for this installation. Once the grounds and +12v leads were connected to the appropriate ground bus and relay, I tied the light bar into the waterproof connection point on the roof and tested the dashboard installed switch panel to activate the light.

HOLY BRIGHT.

That’s about all I can say. The specs on this 30” bar using the available 5w CREE LED’s is roughly 16,500 lumens. Let me tell you, even in broad daylight, this thing is blinding. Let me report that this thing is one of the brightest light fixtures I’ve ever seen… and that’s as someone who works in the concert production industry with some serious lighting systems. I’m exceptionally impressed with the build quality, customer service, and actual power of this light bar, and look forward to ordering more products from Black Oak in the future.

Here are the final close-up installation photos... more to come to show off the actual power this thing packs into such a small form factor. In the end, it wasn’t a huge pain to get this installed in what I truly believe is a very clean form, barely noticeable unless you’re really looking for it up there. Thankfully there’s a few millimeters of space under the light above the glass, and also enough room between the light and the cross bar to fit a mounting bracket for a Roof Top Tent in the future if my path goes that way

I had some time home last week (and decent weather!) to work more on the auxiliary electrical system for the WK2. As you’ve seen previously, I built and installed a 4-switch panel in the driver dashboard area to control lighting throughout the Jeep. With 18-7 fire alarm wire I made a loom to get back to a control/relay box that I was building for the rear trunk area to house the electrical components of the system. I ran out of time to work on the control box until a recent work trip, so I had products delivered to the hotel and began constructing the main brain of project.

It was a tossup as to what project box would fit my components, but using Google SketchUp I built a few examples to see what the right option would be; even despite doing this I was still nervous that I got it right. Upon the delivery I breathed a sigh of relief as everything fit. Trimming and labeling the wires of the relay harnesses, I crimped my connectors and installed them to the Blue Sea Systems fuse panel accordingly. Labeling the “trigger” and “+12v” lead of the harness, I got everything ready for the installation of the lights themselves. With the interest of being able to remove the fuse panel, strobe controller, and relays from the box, but have them be secure and organized in the mean time, I used 3M adhesive Velcro to hold them to the project box itself. With everything installed and fitment checked, I removed the components and drilled out the sides of the project box for the 8AWG wire leads from the battery, and left two holes in the side for the 18-6 control loom and aux. lighting wiring.

The Project Box:

Once it had the grommets installed and the leads were crimped and heat shrunk, I brought the box out to the Jeep and fished the fire alarm wire out from under the rear bench seats where I had stored it in April when the switch panel was installed. Pulling the 18-6 wire through the grommet in the side of the project box, I went to work crimping and heat-shrinking the switch wires to the relay trigger leads and the +12v and ground switch wires to the Blue Sea fuse system, thereby activating the power and LEDs on the switch panel itself.

Once the switch leads were heat shrunk and everything was tucked away, I nestled the box itself under the rear bench and used HD Velcro to hold it in place. It ended up being a little further to the passenger side than the photo shows, but it is in a place and is small enough that the bench portions can fold completely flat without coming into contact with the control box. I ran the +12v lead/ground from the battery under the bench hardware trim piece, then under the OEM floor mat and into the battery compartment. It worked flawlessly and is VERY hard to find if you’re not looking for it. I might someday heat shrink that cable too, but for now they’re simply red and black as they run under the flooring. I ran some wiring out of the control box to my multimeter and then the light bar that’s going on the roof (install write-up to come) and was pleased to see that the switches activate each relay appropriately, and the light functions without issue.

One step closer! Next up will be the aux. lighting installations themselves.​

With less than two months until we load this Trailhawk up and take it nearly 7,000 miles across Canada, I’m kind of under a time crunch to get the modifications installed (and fine tuned) before we roll out. One of the things that I’ve wanted to do for a while for a multitude of reasons is install roof rack cross bars. While I’m hoping to not need to run a cargo basket or roof rack for this specific trip, I’d like to have these bars in place to potentially get a roof-top tent in the distant future, carry extra gear if need be, and provide a mount for some auxiliary lighting.

I was scanning eBay a few weeks ago and saw that there was an “open box” set of Rhino Rack RSP-27 cross bars for about $50 under the Amazon/E-Trailer website pricing. These were the bars I wanted, as I believe they’re the sexiest of those available… yeah, I just used sexy to describe a roof rack cross bar, but these taper off to the roof rail height whereas other models end in a T shape, sticking off the ends further than I need them to. At $225 delivered, I wasn’t sure what to expect from the whole open box labeling, but despite a few dents in the OEM box and a bag of hardware open and spilled throughout (the seller included a new bag of hardware in addition to the original, so no hard feelings there) it was a pretty simple process to install the bars, just a few T-25 torx bolts to tie it together and into the factory rails… Couldn’t have taken me more than 20 minutes to get it done.

I was able to drive with them on over Memorial Day holiday as we headed up to Vermont for a friend’s weekend-long BBQ party, and was happy to hear minimal whistling from the bars. I make a living as an audio engineer, so I’m sure it was my hypersensitivity to sound that made me pick up on it, as Dani didn’t mention hearing it at all, so we’re good in that regard. The bars look great up top, and it gives it a bit more of an overland-y aggressive appearance in a subtle way.

I’m looking forward to getting home tomorrow from a week and a half in Northwest Arkansas working on the production of Wal-Mart’s gigantic Shareholder Week events, and spending some time doing electrical work to move forward with furthering the switch panel installation by getting the relay/control box installed, having made some progress with it in the past few nights in my hotel room… the housekeeping service lady probably thinks I’m wiring some kind of bomb detonating device.

​The images are in a gallery, so you can expand them to see more closely.